Six weeks ago at the Old 40 Tavern, a sarsaparilla joint on E. Main Street, our proprietor,
Chip, assembled a pool of gentlemen’s bets. The subject was the U.S. Open and the object was to
pick five players. Lowest three scores will rise to the top of this shark-infested pool.

Chip, a scratch golfer, had a certain gleam in is eye that suggested he has won more of these
than he has lost. Another participant, Wood, once spent a year traveling the world with the New
Jersey Reds, playing against the Harlem Globetrotters — and it is no joke to say he won more games
with a putter in his hands. Wood’s old buddy, Johnny Angel (an alias?), was in town and he looked
smarter than an English major, if not a bartender.

The sap of the group was the sportswriter, yet even he had enough sense to put Tiger Woods at
the top of his list. Everyone did.

Our national championship gets underway this morning at venerable Merion Golf Club in Ardmore,
Pa., just outside of Philadelphia. If you are picking five players, Tiger is No. 1. He has to
be.

Maybe, another American will defend our national pride: Hunter Mahan, Brandt Snedeker, Matt
Kuchar, Phil Mickelson, Jim Furyk, Steve Stricker. They all are in Chip’s pool (although Chip, the
wiliest of his foursome, has Woods as his lone American).

Here is a question: If it is Woods against the field, do you take the field?

It is amazing, really, if you think about it.

Woods has been stalled at 14 majors since his one-legged victory at the 2008 U.S. Open. His
personal life has been an international scandal sheet ever since he hit that fire hydrant in
November 2009. It has been five years since he won a major and, this week, he is surrounded by a
din that would send most other country clubbers into a fetal position.

Woods and his girlfriend, champion skier Lindsey Vonn, are still being tailed by the
National Enquirer. How was that night at the Boom Boom Room in New York last month?

Woods’ illegal drop at the Masters remains a source of simmering controversy. His spat with
Sergio Garcia — which took a sad and grotesque twist with Garcia’s “fried chicken” comment last
month — remains a part of the public conversation. Garcia has been squirreling around in the
background, trying to catch up to Woods, to apologize.

Woods shot a 79 at the Memorial two weeks ago, only two shots off his worst round as a
professional.

Las Vegas has installed him as the 4-1 favorite at Merion.

That is the thing about Woods. He is no longer the prodigy honed from a middle-class ethos, or
Nike’s perfectly packaged pitchman, or, as his father thought of him, some sort of savior. His
image is forever blown — but he remains the world’s No. 1 player, and there is no golfer who is as
mentally tough, or as focused, and it’s not even close.

There has been talk about how Merion’s greens, softened by a deluge of rain, will open things up
for a range of dart shooters. Although that might be the case, this still is the U.S. Open, and it
remains the sternest test of golf in the world. The East Course is a tight track, if a short one
(6,996 yards). The deep rough will be 7 inches tall by Sunday. Natty dressers who have a surfeit of
nerves, or a dearth of short game, will be whimpering by the weekend.

This will be another dogfight, set in front of bloodthirsty Philadelphia sports fans. Woods —
who has won at Torrey Pines, Doral, Bay Hill and TPC Sawgrass this year — likes a good scrap. He
has Chip’s gleam in his eye, and he won’t even need his driver.